Chapter Text
It’s been five years since he’s seen his oldest brother.
The first two weeks were the worst. Waking up after the Merge totally alone in the Monastery with no sign that any of his family had survived. Pouring out his time into studying Master Wu’s broken and burned scrolls, searching for anything to hint where his family might be.
Thank FSM Kai came when he did. Gave him some hope that the others might be okay, too.
But getting letters from the Fire Ninja often wasn’t enough. Lloyd couldn’t hear his voice. Feel his warmth. See his face. He had to rely solely on his memory and the pictures scattered around the Monastery. He’d pace through the building on many sleepless nights, thoughts so loud he could practically hear them, and stare at any picture he could find until he could paint a perfect match without having to look.
He took hold of a frame with a too-tight grip. Eight grinning faces stared up at him—himself, his team, his uncle, and Pixal. His hands were shaking but he didn’t notice. The glass creaked under the pressure but he didn’t notice. His gaze remained pinned on his family.
They used to be this happy, once. Not anymore. Not two years after the Merge tore everything away.
“Where are you,” he rasped out, voice barely a whisper. A sudden flare of anger burned in his chest. Why did they have to suffer so much? Why did Destiny hate them? Taking his family crossed the line. “Give me an answer.” He was pleading, voice broken.
He was cracking.
His gaze automatically jumped to Cole before he could stop himself.
Someone he could rely on no matter what. Steadfast and strong and always just…there.
Lloyd tore his gaze away and almost dropped the picture as he returned it, his hands vibrating and his breaths shaky. The pounding of his footsteps, usually so careful and quiet, echoed through the empty halls.
Halls once impossible to get silent.
He stumbled past the kitchen, void of motion or food.
Once always filled with the smell of Zane cooking something.
He refused to look inside the living room as he ran past, tipping sideways into the wall as his vision blurred and his breaths caught in his throat.
Kai and Jay arguing about Prime Empire.
His legs buckled, unable to support his weight, and he sank to the ground with a gasp. One hand remained on the wall, steadying himself. The other pressed over his chest as he tried to breathe properly. His pulse thrummed beneath his skin. His breath hitched.
Calm down. Kai’s not here to help.
No, because he was off exploring and trying to find their family.
“STOP!” Lloyd shrieked, his eyes blazing green and his powers sparking between his fingers.
If Kai found him like this, he’d immediately pull the younger into an inescapable hug. So would Cole. He’d feel protected and safe.
But…his brothers weren’t here. He was out in the open, exposed and vulnerable. He shivered as an invisible hand clawed at his unprotected body. He cried out as it tore at his mind.
Alone. All alone. Because you couldn’t stop it.
“Stop…” he whimpered, curling into a tight ball. His back felt so cold, aching for something that wasn’t there; a gaping hole formed in his mind, desperate to be filled with love again. “Please…”
***
His heart froze.
It was a defense mechanism. He couldn’t afford to spend more energy missing his family. They were probably all out there, he had to believe it. Kai continued to send him letters, reassuring him that his brother was alive.
He dedicated his time to training and patrolling any nearby lands, wearing all black and keeping to the shadows. He used a regular steel sword instead of his iconic golden dao. It felt wrong, too heavy in weight and disrespectful to his uncle, but he couldn’t afford to be recognized. He wasn’t sure if he could take it.
Then he met the kids.
And as he showed them around the only safe place he knew, the halls of the Monastery once again radiated with noise.
The kitchen filled with the smell of pies.
The TV in the living room glowing brightly with the colors of Prime Empire.
It was all wrong.
But Lloyd couldn’t show that. He couldn’t give any sign that he wanted things to go back to how they used to be. Arin and Sora deserved a chance. It wasn’t their fault that the Merge happened and ripped away Lloyd’s family.
Arin lost everything, too.
But the foreign familiarity made his skin itch. It made him squirm uncomfortably. It made him desperate to leave, to go back to the silence. It was easier to imagine normalcy when the quiet wasn’t disrupted by shouts and childish giggles.
Maybe…Lloyd’s icy heart melted a little.
When they did get out—against Lloyd’s wishes, but he couldn’t really blame them—it was to the busiest place. The Crossroads Carnival.
He kept his arms curled around his chest, green gi barely poking out beneath a black hoodie—it was Cole’s, too big for him but über soft and warm—and tried to block out the sounds of the carnival. It was too loud. Cole would’ve placed headphones over his ears without any warning to block out the extreme noises.
His family knew of his hybrid blood. The kids didn’t. They wouldn’t. It was something he’d only told his family purely out of situational need.
He lightly stepped around the people filling the streets, his training kicking in as he skirted the worst of the crowds and avoided touching anyone. That right was reserved for only the people he knew best.
Until someone rudely shoved him to the side and he fell into a tent with a pained yelp.
He didn’t want to know if the pain was physical or emotional or mental.
Maybe all three.
He stood quickly, desperate to leave, when he accidentally caught sight of the tent’s interior.
Or, moreso the portraits.
Of them.
Lloyd either stopped breathing or came really damn close. He froze. Locked up. Couldn’t stop staring at the faces of those he loved, bigger than the ones in the Monastery and newer. They looked like they’d been taken right before the Merge five years ago.
Perhaps from the coincidence of wearing Cole’s hoodie, that’s who Lloyd’s gaze locked onto. And this time he really did stop breathing.
Back at the Monastery, he’d…stopped looking at the photos. They were too painful. Reminded him too much of everything he’d lost. Now with them right in front of his face, he couldn’t stop staring.
Cole’s steady brown gaze stared back, frozen in time.
He didn’t look as happy anymore.
But he was still the same Cole.
…Was he the same Lloyd?
The Green Ninja forcibly tore his eyes away and concentrated on breathing properly. He couldn’t crack any more. He had to find his runaway students before they found themselves in deeper trouble.
But as he practically ran after his students—away from the tent—he could sense his oldest brother in every step against the tiled ground, an aching reminder of what he’d lost.
***
It became a little easier when some of his family returned. Kai and Nya, then Zane. Kai and Nya had mentioned hearing Wu’s voice, and how he led them to Zane. His uncle wasn’t exactly accounted for…but not quite lost, either.
Nya said that she’d met up with Cole. He was in the Land of Lost Things, protecting the people trapped there. Lloyd smiled sadly. Of course Cole would be protecting others.
He didn’t show how he desperately wished Cole would come back to him, though. Nya said that they’d taken care of this thing called the Hoarder and Cole had chased after Wu’s voice.
But why couldn’t he come back for just a little?
He shoved those thoughts to the side. No doubt the Earth Ninja’s mission was important.
…Why couldn’t he hear his uncle’s voice? Why was he the only one?
Zane didn’t either, moron, he scolded himself. You’re just being superstitious.
He couldn’t shake the feeling.
***
The visions were getting worse.
It had started as an occasional nightmare—as vivid and terrifying as they were. Landscape bathed in blood red, warriors charging him, this awful gonging sound filling the air. A stone mallet, an intricately carved disk, red, red, red—
Rontu was telling him that he had to let them come. If he couldn’t stop them, might as well accept them, and maybe learn from them. “Possible futures” she called it. That didn’t mean they’d actually happen.
They were still so real and horrifying. He couldn’t accept them. He could never—
And yet again, he was sucked unwilling into a vision. His head burst into a splitting headache.
Red. So much red. Red and frigid air and fear palpable and—
Cole?!
Lloyd was shocked into stillness, his vision-gaze watching three people in a Monastery just like his own. A skeleton, Zane, and that was Cole.
Cole was with Zane!
The vision was ripped away from him with a shout of protest, replaced with glowing wolf warriors closing in on him. Lloyd yelped as his world tipped sideways and he was suddenly hovering over a temple-looking thing, the Gong of Shattering hooked up to a pedestal, that Imperium lady and Lord Ras encroaching on the same skeleton as the beginning of the vision. Ras held a weapon—it was too blurry to see what. The skeleton was latched onto a table, shaking in fear as Ras raised the weapon to strike. His mind whirled in confusion, still shaken from seeing Cole.
“But that will kill him!”
Lloyd choked on air as the Earth Ninja once again appeared in his sight. His brother was furious, the way he looked whenever someone threatened his family. Lloyd tried to reach out, expression distraught, but he couldn’t move.
His mind latched onto Cole’s voice. The first time he’d heard it in years.
He was still trembling from the fear of the vision and the cold that washed over his senses, but his brother was right there!
Of course, it didn’t last, and suddenly he was thrown into the midst of a battle, watching Sora and Kai fight for their lives against the wolf warriors.
An explosion rocked the ground as a red and orange swirling portal burst into existence, black coating the middle, five hooded figures stalking forward from within. The portal consumed Lloyd’s vision, and then he was staring at the blood moon as it painted the landscape in blood red light—
Lloyd screeched, breaking free of the source dragon vision, and doubled over as the headache made itself known again.
But one thing was clear.
“The blood moon!” He cried. “It’s so close—it’s almost here!”
His hand groped for anything to hold onto, skidding uselessly over the stone beneath him. In his terror, he’d nearly forgotten about seeing Cole again. It felt like there was a gaping, cold hole in his heart. He panted raggedly, shivering with lingering cold, until he felt a warm hand in his and someone rubbing his back.
Blearily, he noticed Arin and Sora nearby.
Calm down, he told himself. Get it together!
His hand closed around Kai’s, perhaps a little too tightly, but the other Ninja didn’t say a word as Lloyd grounded himself.
He stood on shaky legs, perhaps looking slightly crazed but not caring in the moment. “Unless we stop him, Lord Ras is going to sacrifice someone!” He gasped out. “And Cole and Zane are doomed!” His voice caught at the name of the not-so-missing Ninja.
Never had he felt more desperate to reunite with his oldest brother. The pain in his chest stood out prominently.
***
The battle was over. They’d won.
Kai was gone.
Lloyd shivered as he wrapped his arms around himself, separated slightly from the others. He was achy and tired from the battle, a few fresh cuts still untreated. He’d let the visions come and learned the rising dragon technique. He’d seen Cole again and again in the visions, an ache in his heart growing each time.
He glanced up at Nya, who was deep in conversation with Sora and Arin. He couldn’t pull her away, she was busy. Kai was gone, so…he sensed that gaping hole in his mind open up again. He felt numb and disconnected.
With the sun rising, they decided to regroup at the hovering Cloud Kingdom parked nearby. Lloyd trailed after the others with a blank expression. Arin might’ve noticed, since he kept glancing back, but said nothing.
The others climbed up onto the island before Lloyd. He followed a bit later, motions automatic instead of deliberate.
He rounded a corner of the Cloud Kingdom and his gaze landed on the group already gathered.
Cole met his eye and his face split into a grin.
Lloyd had to forcibly restrain himself from sprinting over. Not in front of the kids— But his pace did speed up, his heart pounding, his guard crumbling.
His mind wouldn’t let him believe it was real until Cole’s arms wrapped around him with a delighted laugh, and Lloyd sank into the embrace with a choked gasp, because he missed this and he needed it and it was perfect—
“Hey, buddy,” the older Ninja breathed affectionately, one hand rubbing small circles on Lloyd’s back. His armor pressed into Lloyd and it wasn’t exactly comfortable, but he didn’t care. He melted into his brother, once again surrounded and protected and safe. “You okay?”
Lloyd shook his head slightly and bit his lip, refusing to move. With Kai gone and Ras missing, he couldn’t be okay.
His brother didn’t seem surprised and squeezed him tighter.
Lloyd somehow, by some miracle, managed to compose himself as they gently split apart, his forced smile watery. “Next time,” he rasped, “you’re fighting with us.”
Cole grinned. “What, a side quest wasn’t enough?” He teased. When he saw Lloyd’s smile waver, his expression softened. “Don’t worry,” he said gently, giving the younger’s shoulder a squeeze. “I’ll be right by your side.”